An unmanned Russian supply ship successfully latched onto the international space station Thursday after an earlier attempt failed, an official said.
“The repeat attempt to hook up the ship with the station has been a success,” Mission Control spokesman Valery Lyndin told The Associated Press.
A faulty antenna apparently prevented an unmanned Russian cargo ship from mooring completely to the international space station Thursday, but the three-man crew was never in any danger, Mission Control said.
The antenna on the Progress M-58 spacecraft apparently failed to fold, keeping the ship from hooking up fully on its initial attempt, said Mission Control spokesman Valery Lyndin.
The ship is delivering fresh fruit and vegetables, compact discs and DVDs and other gifts to the station's current crew, U.S. astronaut Michal Lopez-Alegria, Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Tyrin and German Thomas Reiter.
Also aboard the ship are meals prepared by chef Alain Ducasse including caponata, a Sicilian dish made of peppers, tomatoes and zucchini; roasted quails in a wine sauce from France's Madiran region; smooth celery root puree with nutmeg; and rice pudding with preserved fruit.
Equipment for repairing a Russian-built Elektron oxygen generator, which overheated last month, spreading burnt-rubber smell and leaking potassium hydroxide, is included in the shipment.
While the incident forced the crew to don masks and gloves in the first emergency ever declared aboard the 8-year-old orbiting outpost, Russian and U.S. space officials downplayed it, saying crew members' lives were never in any danger.
